As many as 1,790 families hit by the benefit cap in Birmingham should be exempt from the "cruel" and "outdated" measure, a new report has found.

The controversial reform was introduced in 2013 to limit the total amount of benefits a household can receive.

It was designed to motivate people into work - but a new report by the parliamentary Work and Pensions Committee has claimed most affected households are not in a position to escape it.

The committee found that 82% of capped households had already been assessed as facing barriers to work - mainly due to childcare and health problems - and had no conditions attached to their benefits saying they must work or even search for a job.

The Committee are calling for such households to be exempt - a move that would release an estimated 1,790 households from the cap across Birmingham.

In total, there were 2,188 families in our city having their benefits capped as of November 2018 - 1,459 of whom were single mothers. Frank Field MP, chair of the Committee, said: “It would be difficult to think of a more cruel cut.

“Benefits are being cut with the aim of driving people into work, but four in five people bearing this cut aren’t expected to work.

“What genius in government thought this one up?”

The Committee found that for every 100 households affected by the cap, only around five will have moved into work because of it.

The report also flags up the fact that benefits are already set at levels “inadequate” for basic living costs, and this is only made worse by both the cap and the move to Universal Credit.

(Image: Getty Images)

Before Universal Credit (UC) only Housing Benefit could be capped, but under UC a household's whole award can be reduced, cutting into their entire income - even benefits meant for children.

The little money these households have left can be further reduced by deductions to their UC awards, for example to repay “Advances” people have taken to tide them over the minimum five-week wait for a first UC payment.

The Committee say they are already hearing of “extreme but real” instances of families left with so little their children are being taken into care because of neglect.

What the committee said

Heidi Allen, an independent member of the committee, said: "All government policy must be based on evidence, yet there is scarce evidence to suggest the cap is moving people into work.

“This cap and the benefits freeze are outdated policies, not taking into account the increased cost of living since their inception.

“Bluntly, the government doesn’t have the objective or moral grounds on which to maintain its position."

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The report also found that the policy is falling short of its objective to introduce greater fairness between those on out-of-work benefits and taxpayers in employment.

It argues that families in work were already better off than similar families who were out-of-work, without the cap.

The government set the cap by referring to earned income, without taking into account the additional benefits that in-work families can receive.

Similarly, the report argues that the benefit cap may not even be saving the government that much money.

The claimed savings of £190 million a year are just 1% of expected savings from welfare reforms since 2010, and a mere 0.1% of the total welfare bill.

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In recognition of the hardship caused by the cap, the government gives back a significant portion of the money it takes from claimants to local councils, for Discretionary Housing Payments.

The figure also fails to consider the increased costs to local authorities through temporary accommodation, or the wider costs that hardship created by the cap has on other public services and on wider civil society. ·